#I have so many thoughts about how storytelling works differently when people say true and messy things in the moment not checked over in a

[exhaustedwerewolf]

my heart is someone else’s

[leonardcohenofficial]

hello i would love to hear your general thoughts re: tenmartha if you feel like sharing them

okay so many thoughts about dr. martha jones and the doctor but one of the main ones is that despite popular (misogynoir-driven) belief, martha's character as written is much stronger than people give the series credit for. i think so much of her very strong character development and arc (based in her growing into her self-sufficiency, which was always there from the start and demonstrated in her constant analysis and questioning in the search for the most info to make the right decisions) is overshadowed by fandom racism, too much focus given to the unrequited crush storyline (which is also key to her arc, but is also something that she very distinctly and importantly gets over!), and general "she's not rose" sentiment. i think it's really interesting that unlike rose or donna whose narrative arcs need them to become super-human, martha essentially becomes the doctor's equal by the end of her run, if not surpassing him given the fact that as a human, she doesn't have those same otherworldly powers as him.

while i think the narrative of season three ultimately lets her come out on top, i think there is a big cost to that, for both martha the character and for the viewers. even separate from fandom racism there are so many moments of racism in the series that i don't think actually do anything to further the storytelling (literally fuck the whole human nature/the family of blood storyline) and that puts a damper on much of that whole year for me despite loving the characters. i also understand why the doctor (via the writers) is constantly comparing martha to rose, but the moments where martha calls him out on it—while they are certainly there—aren't always enough. i think that fact that martha also begins as fairly dependent on the doctor's validation (which like. makes total sense, she has no idea how all this works and is getting thrown into insane scenarios with no info from the jump) gets reduced to calling the character "needy" which just simply isn't true. this is also something that i think people focus on a bit too much rather than seeing how that particular character trait shifts throughout her season.

all this to say, when tenmartha is good, it's fantastic. freema agyeman and david tennant's chemistry is so on point, and that saves a lot of otherwise mediocre-to-bad writing. from the jump martha is shown to be so SO fucking smart, self-reliant, willing to take risk, and uninterested in the doctor's bullshit; when the doctor isn't just whining in the post-rose hangover or treating her like crap, he recognizes how powerful she is AND how much potential she has to continue to hone her skills, which is why he trusts her so inherently and ends up leaning on her so much during that season. the fact that he manipulates her emotionally to me is equal parts hard to watch and based writing-wise in a lot of the aforementioned -isms AND interesting character development from him because we haven't really seen that type of messy fucked up (human) behavior from the doctor. and then martha leaves on her own terms, which no other companion has gotten to do (clara's storyline feels different in that regard to me). she realizes she doesn't need him, arguably becomes his equal (or surpasses him) in terms of skill, and makes it out alive. imho that's a pretty big accomplishment.

[duhragonball]

Akira Toriyama (1955-2024)

I wouldn't say I'm feeling better today, but I'm feeling less bad than yesterday. So let's see if I can put some words together.

In case anyone still hasn't heard, Dragon Ball creator Akira Toriyama passed away on March 1, 2024. This news was made public on March 7 or 8. I woke up early on Friday morning and found out while I was checking Twitter. I had a long, busy day at work, and I kept getting on my phone to scroll through fan reactions and tributes.

I think that, more than anything, is what's gotten me so worked up about his death. My Twitter timeline and my tumblr dashboard were just chock full of touching message and images about how Akira Toriyama's work has changed their lives. I wanted to write my own tribute, but I'm not sure what else I can say that hasn't already been expressed by Archie Comics, professional wrestling trio The New Day, and the Republic of El Salvador.

There's this immense, global community of fans, and it's easy to lose sight of just how big it is. It's easy to get bogged down in the infighting and petty squabbles. I saw one tweet responding to the criticism of Dragon Ball not being like this "entry level" franchise compared to other, more high brow anime and manga. It's popular with so many people, that critics will assume it's designed to appeal to the lowest-common-denominator. But the opposite is true! Dragon Ball is accessible, which is how so many people from so many different places and walks of life can get into it. The guy telling the story was such a master storyteller that he could grab an audience's attention and make it look easy. So easy that the haters would start to think that it was a trick, and he must be overrated.

Let me talk about this panel for a minute.

Last night I started going through the original manga, looking for panels to screencap. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do, but I thought maybe a selection of panels that really stood out for me might be worth posting. I'll probably still do that one of these days, but I got to this one, where Gohan tells Chi-Chi about Goku's death, and it hit me like a ton of bricks.

This was a powerful scene in the anime, of course, but in the comic it's even more profound. It's just one panel, no dialogue, because the reader already knows what's happening here. We know Gohan is telling his mother that Goku died in the Cell Games, and that he refuses to be wished back, because he thinks his presence on Earth will attract new enemies. It was hard enough to hear when Goku said it to Gohan and the others, and now Gohan has to relay that message to Goku's wife. All she can do is lie prostate on the floor and weep.

And look at the composition. She's surrounded by all that negative space. Gohan's there for her, but she still feels so alone, surrounded by her husband's absence. Pots of flour for food he'll never eat. An empty chair he might have sat in. Their son, who will have to grow up without him.

I saw this, as though for the first time, and it was so gut-wrenching that I had to post it by itself. I felt like it summed up my feelings better than any words could. We're all Chi-Chi in this panel, reacting to Akira Toriyama's death. And we're all Gohan too, each of us consoling one another with our own thoughts and tributes.

So what did Akira Toriyama mean to us all? Lots of people have answered this in a lot of different ways. Obviously his art, storytelling and cultural impact speak for themselves. I've seen people compare him to other luminaries like Jack Kirby and Osamu Tezuka. I'll try to add my own two cents with this:

I wrote a post about "Dragon Ball Daima" back when it was first announced, and I led off with this image of a note from Akira Toriyama. I guess this was from some big fancy presentation about Daima at a convention. I forget which one. In particular, I was skeptical that the Daima rumors were even true, and if they were, the whole idea seemed half-baked to me. Turning Goku into a kid had been done before, and it wasn't exactly successful the first time.

But this note from Toriyama was very reassuring to me. More than the trailer clips and character designs, this was what got me interested in the show. That's because he took the time to not only hype up the show, but also to explain what's going on behind the premise. He took the time to tell everyone that he's working on this show, and what "Daima" means, and why all the characters get turned into kids. It's "due to a conspiracy", and the good guys will have to "fix things". In short, he established a plot, conflict, and resolution to the story. He didn't just slap this together to sell new merch. I'm sure that was part of the motivation to make Daima, but there's more to it than that.

I think that's the loss I feel with Toriyama's passing. It's not that there won't be new Dragon Ball stories in the future. I'm sure others will continue telling their own versions long after I'm gone. I'm not that worried about the fate of Daima. I'm sure they'll figure something out, whether it's delayed, rewritten, or canceled. But we'll never see another message from Toriyama to promote a new project, and that's what I'll miss. From here on, his credit will just be an acknowledgement of his past contributions.

There's this great credibility with Akira Toriyama's name. Fans will argue about how involved he was in a project as a way of establishing how good or bad it was. Dragon Ball GT has his name on the credits, and he provided some designs and artwork early on, and for some fans that proves the series has his endorsement. For others, the sole problem with the show is that he wasn't directly writing the script. There's similar debates over Dragon Ball Super, where he was involved, but only writing those mysterious "notes". So if a fan doesn't like something in DBS, who do they blame? Did Toriyama lose his touch, or did his co-creators fumble the ball? Dragon Ball Evolution basically ignored all of Toriyama's advice and bombed, while Battle of Gods, Resurrection F, Broly, and Super Hero all put Toriyama's writing credits up at the very beginning, and each film made plenty of money. I read his comments on the Daima confirmation, and immediately thought "Okay, this should be pretty good. Akira Toriyama knows what's up."

That's gone now. I mean, there's still a lot of talent out there, but we'll never again have the little gas mask-wearing robot telling us that this story will be good because he worked on making it good. I don't think I really appreciated how much I trusted that guy until now. I still can't believe he's really gone.

I'll probably have more to say about this in the coming days, but I'll stop here for now. Thanks for letting me ramble a bit on this.

[goodluckclove]

I've been meaning to say something. (100 follower hot take)

Hey! Thanks for stopping by. I hope you've had a nice day. Why don't you rest with me for a while? I made some chocolate chip cookies - with shortening instead of butter, so they're very soft and very chocolatey. I made way too many and they aren't my wife's favorite, so I could use some help in eating them.

You're probably a writer, right? Or maybe you think about how you could be. Browse the tags here, or on other social media platforms. Maybe you used to write stories as a kid. I bet those were fun. Teachers might've thought they were impressive, or they dissected them line by line until the words didn't make sense in your head anymore. Either way, if you're here you're probably here for a reason.

(rant alert)

I dipped a toe in online writing communities on and off. My last attempt was forty-five minutes scrolling through the writing hashtag on Youtube Shorts (so TikTok, I guess? I don't know). I didn't like it. I really didn't. The thing that sticks out the strongest in my mind is one particular video where a woman claims that every story needs a second act plot twist.

Huh? Every story? All of them? Why? Since when? Who are you? What qualifications do you have to make a statement like that?

That's the common thread that makes a lot of writing spaces very uncomfortable for me. Successful writers are really only successful in their genre and for the given moment, so they don't have that much objective authority in the craft. And yet I see a lot of people deciding the things that you can't do in writing. Or the things you have to do, and how you have to do them. It was so much of Writeblr at first glance that I almost dipped out once again. I didn't, though, and I'm glad I didn't because now I get to watch some of the next great storytellers from across the world grow and examine and forge their way forward.

No one can teach you how to write. No, that's not true. Teachers teach literacy. Handwriting. Typing maybe - do schools still teach typing? Let me try saying it in a different way - no one, not one single person on this goddamned planet, has the right to tell you how to make a story.

I was supposed to get my MFA in creative writing before my first breakdown. My uncle stayed in the program I was meant to be in, and a few years after I dropped out he graduated. Recently I had the thought to look up his thesis novella, and as I searched I found myself regretting my decision to leave school. If I stayed and got to develop my writing in an actual class, with other writers and a knowledgeable professor, how much further along would I be than where I am right now?

It was bad. His novella was terrible. It was so bad I had a small existential crisis for, like, three days. He spent so much money on years and years of professional education and came out with a truly soulless story that read as if you prompted an AI to write the next Great American Novel. So if you think you need a writing degree to be a legitimate author, it could help connections-wise, but it ultimately won't be the thing that does the work for you.

Not all advice I see online on writing is bad. I find the people who are able to capture the "I" statements of therapy and phrase advice as things that have worked for them, or things that they personally enjoy, to be fine. Some writing advice can spark inspiration.

But if someone is the type of person to boil every story down to troupes and cliches, and then immediately say that every story that uses the trait they don't like is automatically bad for everyone? I'm dropping the kindness for a second - that's trash. That's a trash take and I see far too many writers use it as a reason to stop before they begin.

I don't like whump. I say my reasons in previous posts if you go back through my blog. But you will never hear me say that any story with whump in it is bad, because I don't know that. You might prove me wrong. I am an adult human being and I have the humility to admit that I can like something I didn't expect to. I genuinely enjoy the direction of The Human Centipede (only the first one) and if you cringed just now that probably means you haven't seen it.

There are so many types of books and movies and plays and comics out there. To enjoy a specific genre is fine, to ignore the existence of everything else is a really, really, really odd thing to do. Maybe someone will hate your story because they think everything should be Neil Gaiman, and therefore have no way to understand your epistolary high-Western. You are not the wrong end of that situation just for existing.

And at there is a definite threshold on how many writing tips you can gather before they stop being useful. If you find them interesting, that's one thing. That's fine. But if the culture of creativity online has made you feel like you need to educate yourself on every possible angle before you can write a story, you are actively harming yourself.

Imagine taking the level of structure you put on yourself in that way and putting it on children playing pretend in the backyard. Oh, Susie, don't you know that it's overdone for your Kitsune have dead parents? Xyler, shouldn't you ask someone else before you decide how Spiderman would react to this? It would make no sense and they do not need it. Kids will make a whole world out of nothing and it's the most fucked thing in my heart that at some point they get access to Reddit and dipshits start insisting that's wrong.

They aren't wrong and you aren't either. Your favorite creative influencer can't tell you your story, strangers on the internet can't tell you your story, your teachers and loved ones can't tell you your story. They can influence it, but they can't write it honestly the way you can.

You do that. That's the thing you do.

Man that makes me upset. I can't tell you how to make a story, either. If anyone sends me asks for writing advice the most I'll do is say what I've done before hopping into your DMs and starting a direct conversation. it's so personal to each individual artist, and I'd like to think that the people selling these classes and software and promoting these platforms haven't thought about that before. Otherwise it does feel manipulative. If you have a willingness to practice and imagine and really experiment with the possibilities, you are ready to write your story.

And if it doesn't work? Try again. That's what you do.

Stephen King has written roughly a thousand books and maybe five of them have decent endings. He is unimaginably successful.

I'm rambling now. I think I got that out of my system. I was really worried to say this out of fear of being too weird or somehow reverse-gatekeeping so hard that it circles back into also being a bad thing. I've just spoken to a lot of people who I still think of throughout my day, and I truly ache for them to get past the fear of creation. Because it's worth it. It's worth it and it's fun, even when it's messy and you're tired.

Let it Be just came on. Beatles. I haven't listened to The Beatles in a long time. Feels a little apropos.

I love you, reader. Reader, Writer, Colleague. Take care of yourself. Especially the little you, still sitting there in the backyard of your soul, bathing in the sun with their bare feet in the damp earth.

Consider joining them, maybe.

[voiice-of-the-soul]

finally sharing my own personal headcanons for medic. keep in mind this is just my own interpretation of him.

-the story about him yoinking a guy's skeleton is one of the many he tells when someone asks him why he lost his license. he changes it up to a different one every single time and no one really knows which one is true.

-he is an excellent storyteller. he's good with words, has an endless array of things he could speak about and the obvious one, he loves to talk. though most of the stories are pretty morbid and his dark humour does not appeal to most people.

-he has other qualifications besides medicine and science. there was a brief period of time when he worked as a mortician and would harvest the organs of corpses for experiments. shockingly enough, he's also a licensed psychiatrist. nobody believes him though.

-i feel like he would be a good artist. he does very detailed anatomy studies but he also has many little sketches of his doves. it calms his nerves when he gets manic.

-i also think he'd be a big fan of junji ito's work. they have a similiar jovial and goofy nature while simultaneously creating the most horrifying shit.

-he and spy go way back before either of them were hired by mann co. they both fought in wwll as members of a resistance group, which medic joined after fleeing from germany.

-he has low affective empathy but pretty good cognitive empathy. he often words things wrong when attempting to comfort someone but if you brought it to his attention, he'd be like "oh, i never thought of it that way! i apologize!"

-he is generally polite to people as long as they don't undermine him or his work. treat him with respect and he'll extend the same courtesy to you. that being said, he is absolutely not a pushover, as we've seen multiple times. he knows his worth and when someone steps on his tail like cheavy did, he will retaliate tenfold.

-alot of people say he hates children which i do not agree with at all. i think he has a soft spot for them and he secretly always wanted to be a father. his paternal side occassionally comes out when he's interacting with his birds. if he ever had a kid of his own, he would pamper them and carry them around in his arms everywhere.

-another unpopular opinion but i think he is more understanding than people give him credit for. he would try to reassure someone if they were scared to undergo surgery for whatever reason and make jokes in an attempt to ease the tension. he's not always particularly successful at it but it's the thought that counts.

-he is very passionate and feels all of his emotions strongly with little to no inbetween. it's either extreme love or extreme spite.

-he is quite observant and endlessly fascinated by human behaviour. he enjoys interacting with people so he gets to dissect (often quite literally) and pick their brains. though his observations come across as very clinical which unnerves most people.

-i think he is more gentle with women than he is with men. i mean, just look at how he talks to miss pauling.

-he plays up his evilness so people will think he's just a one track mind lunatic. he enjoys catching people by surprise when he gets serious.

-while i personally don't think he would outright hate any animal, i think he gets nervous if a cat is in the vicinity of his birds.

[myobsessionsspace]

Hi! This is a reply to the anon asking about Jungkook and his songwriting process. I work in a creative field and have many friends who work in creative fields so that has a big influence on how I view this topic.

The first thing I want to talk about is how every person has a completely different creative process. But one thing I have noticed is that contrary to popular belief most people do not get inspiration from hard times or going through difficult experiences. For most people the inspiration comes from having grown as a person, the conversations and things that helped them during those times or from totally different things. Most of the time feeling bad can block you from feeling inspiration or being creative alltogether. And I believe this is also true for Jungkook. I don't think he is a person who gets inspired by difficult life experiences.

Another thing is that from what I have seen he seems to get a lot of inspiration and joy from the process of making itself. This is how inspiration works for a lot of people. People get ideas by working very hard, doing other parts of the project and practicing a lot. Inspiration is not something that just happens most of the time, it's something that you work on. It's not as romantic as getting inspired by big life events or getting struck by an idea but it is very fun.

It makes complete sense to me how he talked about wanting to focus on how to use his voice and the more technical aspects of making music. I also think he is not someone who is creative in a language focussed way. I don't think he is a storyteller like RM. RM likes to make people think and get them engaged in thinking about life, society and other big topics.

I think the thing that Jungkook enjoys the most is how he can make people feel and that he can make them forget about everything for a while and help them really be in the moment. That makes him have different goals in his songwriting and creative process. Lyrics and what the song is about are not his main focus and he is comfortable letting other people do that part for him. His focus is more on how he can express the feelings of the song in the best way (using his voice, instruments, tempo etc.). And also I think that he is most interested in and talented at the parts that are seen as less interesting by a lot of people. Or that are more behind the scenes and less visible to the average person.

He is very good in expressing himself in other ways than language. The most important ways being visual (think about his editing and photography), through dance and through sound. He loves singing and playing around with his voice and he loves dancing and performing.

And he does express himself alot. He shows his feelings on his face and with his whole body and he seems to really be himself in every situation. But I think he is someone who really lives in the moment and he doesn't dwell on his feelings once he is done feeling them. I don't think he is someone who processes their feelings through language or talking. And I would not be surprised if it takes him a very long time to process his feelings. He probably does it on his own when he is somewhere he feels safe and comfortable. So deep conversations about his feelings and thoughts is probably something we will never see from him.

Maybe it's because I am very similar to him in a lot of ways but to me he doesn't seem hard to understand at all. Everything he says and does makes so much sense to me. I have the easiest time understanding him out of all the members. Hope that helps!

in reference to this ask

Yes, yes, yes!⬆️⬆️⬆️

Thank you lovely for your thoughts and insights.

I was also thinking about the creative that Jungkook is and how he also uses film, photography, art of different mediums to express himself too.

There’s so much that we can add, and I appreciate you and anyone else adding to this conversation.

Thank you 💜

[bardkin]

an important thing i've come to realize about my fictionkinity is that my source is my mythology; an embellished or abridged representation of me.

i know there's a post i reblogged ages ago that uses this line of thought (source = legend & fanon = folklore, or something similar), but i can't remember it & wanna put this in my own words.

plus, this is about my personal beef with "canon divergent" as a descriptor for myself, so finding & re-reblogging that post wouldn't satiate the bees in my brain lol

i think it ties into why i adopted folcintera as a term, because i do not see my source as fact. (my source in particular would've turned out very different, if not for the censors on Cartoon Network. all i need to say is "Rubphire wedding," and folks in the know will nod sagely and/or get angry as i still am about how Sugar & their story was treated by CN.)

i thought myself to be canon divergent for a long time, but that just... never totally felt right. it felt more like a label i thought i had to adopt because i'm not just like the Steven in the show/games/comics. i'm just... me; a version of the character that many, many people saw. nothing more & nothing less.

i am my own folklore, taken from my own myth, in the most mundane ways possible.

my source is only rigid because it has to be. that's how documented storytelling works; it is immutable in the final product, be that prose, picture, film, animation, or whathaveyou. new versions of it are made when the original story gets released into the hands of fans, who go on to create different immutable pieces of their own.

myth into folklore, and such and so on. i don't fully know if any of that makes any tangible sense, but like, bare with me-

i'm wholly psychological in my framework, in regards to being Steven. the origin of how it happened doesn't really matter, because i'm still Steven at the end of the day. i have what i label knowledge and memories of things that happened & people i met and love(d) in that story, because the information sits in roughly the same space as my other, physical, memories. sometimes i ache for that story and world, because i've always felt like i was supposed to be somewhere other than physically here. i'm Steven in my brain and in my heart.

so when i first started questioning being fictionkind, almost a full year ago at this point (thanks to @aestherians for encouraging me to dig deeper into this part of myself lol), it felt quietly disingenuous to label myself as "canon divergent."

and that feels like a seemingly small thing that shouldn't matter. but i'm still bothered by it; more than a little. hence why i'm tossing that term over my shoulder and never looking back :3c

viewing myself as just Me and knowing that a lot of things will and won't line up with my source is fine. source is a version of my and other Stevens' stories, told through the limitations it was allotted. for some, those limitations were true for them; others, not so much (to varying degrees).

[queer-ragnelle]

Hi there, you don't have to post this on the blog, but I wanted to thank you for your earlier post with regard to different interpretations and iterations of Arthuriana. I really admire your work in/thoughts on all things Arthurian, and seeing you say "Each iteration is it's own self-contained world and anything is possible within that framework" was such a freeing thing. I'm currently writing an Arthurian thing where Lancelot falls for/ends up with someone who isn't Guinevere, and I often wrestle with the doubt of "if he isn't in love with Guinevere, am I really being true to the stories and the canon?" But each iteration is its own self-contained world, and I can honor the stories in other ways while still doing my own thing in this particular story/world. Anyway, all this to say, I'm sure it wasn't your intention, but I appreciate your insight and the encouragement it brings. Take care!

Hi there! Sorry for the delay in responding, but I wanted to think about this a bit beforehand. In writing my own Arthurian series, as well as reading and watching absolutely everything I can get ahold of, historical, medieval, and modern, I’ve developed a whole philosophy about it. So my reply got long hehe. Here’s what I think…

In the ask you referenced, I talked about how Arthurian legend lacks a true "canon," and how the stories all build off each other. The inconsistency from text to text and even chapter to chapter within the same story affords us endless opportunities for creative reinterpretation. I can basically be sold on any concept. I’ve read a lot of retellings at this point and I’m not married to any specific “canon.” If the writer can convince me that, in this version of the story, things played out differently, then I’m happy to get invested. For example, in Exiled From Camelot by Cherith Baldry, she develops Lyonors, Gareth’s wife, and makes her into a likable character the reader can easily ship with Gareth. On the other hand, I definitely see why people prefer Lynette with Gareth, as Tennyson did, and the majority of other retellings follow suit. Even so, I think Lynette and Gaheris made an adorable pair in Squire’s Tales #3, and it was a satisfying reveal in Squire’s Tales #7 that the pov character was their daughter, Lunette. It’s indicated through context clues who her parents are when they arrive at the end referring to each other by pet names. In the same vein, while I favor Ragnelle, Gawain can have any number of partners so long as the author writes the chemistry well. And while I still firmly believe Agravaine is gay in essentially every retelling, I do love Sarah Zettel’s romance Camelot’s Blood that she wrote between him and Laurel. I’m an Orkney Wives fan first and an Orkney Bros fan second haha!

That being said, Orkney Bros have always been inconsistent, so changing their love interests isn’t actually that drastic. In the case of Lancelot and Guinevere, severing their romantic connection is a huge departure from the norm. Undoubtedly, some people won’t “get it” or say it’s out of character. But the thing to remember is, there is no singular source for Arthuriana, so how can they ever be out of character? Let’s get into it.

Firstly, you don’t need to rationalize your narrative choices. To anybody. So long as you’re writing something for the sake of authenticity and good storytelling (rather than simply to be contrarian or edgy or quirky etc) it will resonate with your audience. That said, there’s medieval precedence for your concept. In Alliterative Morte Arthure, Lancelot is listed many times as one of Arthur’s knights. He’s there. Yet it is Mordred who adulterously marries Guinevere. In the romance retelling Lancelot by Gwen Rowley, Guinevere is not the love interest, but Elaine. Another similar angle is explored in Port Eternity by CJ Cherryh, which takes place entirely from Elaine’s point of view. Guinevere isn’t even truly in it and her stand in doesn’t fulfill the same role. In The Adventures of Sir Lancelot (1956), Lancelot definitely has A Thing with both the King and Queen, but a potential affair is not explored or even hinted at. He’s their bestie, their confidant, their most trusted person apart from each other. The key here is Lancelot still loves Guinevere (or her stand in), however that manifests. There’s no active dislike or hatred between them. In that circumstance, I don’t think the character would feel like Lancelot anymore. But changing the nature of his love for Guinevere from romantic to something else does not diminish its narrative value, as the above examples prove. Their friendship is the core of their relationship, as the Vulgate proves, and maintaining that is important.

It’s not so much about asking yourself, “Is [narrative choice] true to the ‘canon?’” as asking, “How do I tell a good story containing [narrative choice]?” There are examples of this done poorly, in my opinion. I’ve elaborated many many many times about David Lowery’s fumbling of The Green Knight (2021) and how that particular iteration falls short of a true adaptation (which I don’t think he set out to do anyway, to be fair) but also proved an unsuccessful reimagining of the poem due to mismanaged references and motifs. I didn’t like Once & Future by Cori McCarthy and Amy Rose Capetta or The Winter Knight by Jes Battis for the same reasons—both books felt like shallow, meandering stories lacking narrative integrity with a veneer of Arthuriana over it. Reincarnation AUs are not an excuse to flanderaize characters. Battis writes Wayne (Gawain) acknowledging how drastically he differs from his medieval counterpart, but awareness of it doesn’t negate the facts: the story suffers for it. On the contrary, Camelot 3000 gives an entire character arc surrounding this premise to Tristan, who has reincarnated AFAB and struggles with his gender identity and with accepting Isolde’s love for him, changed though he is. First Knight (1995) really screws up by making Lancelot a misogynistic creeper who relentlessly pursues Guinevere and even forces a kiss on her. King Arthur: Legend of The Sword (2017) is insultingly bad by showcasing just how stupid it thinks its audience is, brutalizing and killing women left and right, giving unnecessary screen time to obnoxious OCs, and bastardizing every aspect of the legend it drew from. Meanwhile the Fate Grand Order anime cuts out Guinevere entirely. Her role exists as a void. It makes no sense, then, that Lancelot and Agravaine clash as “fellow traitors,” because the woman at the center of the conflict is literally never present. Seven Deadly Sins anime has finally gotten around to Lancelot and Guinevere meeting, and she’s a clingy girl Lancelot is disinterested in, trying to flip the script on their roles, and only exacerbating the misogyny problem in shounen in the process.

Fear not! Loving Arthurian legend automatically enshrines anything you create in a glittering anti-garbage shield! So many versions exist that draw on the elements just because they can with no respect for the material nor their audience. You literally can’t do worse than what’s already out there and there are no original ideas! Published retellings love crackships, they love mixing it up, changing the expected, surprising us! So long as Guinevere isn’t made worse to make Lancelot’s alternative love interest better, and Lancelot himself isn’t turned inside out until he’s unrecognizable, you’re golden. Follow your gut and write something you would enjoy, develop it well within your own universe, and there will be an audience for it. I’m certainly among them!

Thanks for the ask. Have a lovely day! :^)

[forever-will-last]

hello again, it’s me, 🧿

i know it’s been a while, but i couldn’t find it in me to not write you this particular message considering the fact that it was hard to ignore the impact your last 3 chapters (of a thousand pictures) did to me/for me.

it’s been a difficult time to say the least. for the longest, longest time, it’s always felt difficult because… it’s actually been difficult. life is full of it’s trials and tribulations, but at some point (at least for me) it’s hard not to exist in the “why” of it all. in order to keep it short however, that’s the space in which i have been existing in for many years, creating a monster of inner conflict of its own. it was difficult to understand the point of everything, but part of your story was a gentle reminder that life happens, whether we get it or not, and we go through it in bits and pieces; and that was my calm.

with that being said, i want to highlight the significance of what brought me here, and at first it was supposed to be chapter 4; i knew that crying while reading that chapter meant that it struck something inside, but wow how i didn’t expect the storm that came with 49, let alone with 50 :)

your ability to capture not only these very specific and important perspectives, but to simultaneously align them together (seamlessly might i add) and make a meaningful journey that explores these complex characters just showcases what a gift you have in writing. i saw a lot of myself in these characters, particularly in regina (but in unbelievable different ways), and it was beyond cathartic to have a moment of reflection like that through your storytelling.

i wasn’t realizing what an impact some parts of the story had on me, but when it clicked it felt like a true reflection of what i’ve been feeling that i haven’t been able to put into words, so i’m here to say: thank you for putting them into words and for writing unforgettable, memorable, and purposeful stories.

thank you for being such a thoughtful author, it’s truly been a treasure to read your work.

take care, and warmest regards,

🧿

🧿, I read and reread this ask several times between last night and today. It's absolutely amazing to me that people not only like my writing, but it's had such huge profound impacts on people. It's crazy to me, because this whole thing, all of this, started with a friend jokingly asking what would happen to the plot of mean girls if Aaron just straight up died in the middle of the plot. Now, here we are, six months and 350k words later.

I'm genuinely so moved by this ask. I never, ever expected this story to have such a profound impact on people, even when the topics were very serious. It just never clicked in my brain, I suppose? I always went into this fic with the mindset of "I want to depict grief, loss, and all of the ways in which it manifests as realistically as possible". Sure, some of these things aren't directly connected to grief, but it's all interwoven. They may not really often think or talk about Aaron in their day-to-day lives, but it is without a doubt that his death set their lives in a completely different direction than what they ever intended.

I'm so glad this work has been able to have a positive impact on your life and the life of others. I hope to continue to make stories, both in the threequel, pretty good, and in other fics in the future.

Thank you again, and I hope you have a fantastic week 💖

[spacedlexi]

Have you read the new clementine book? I'd like to hear your thoughts on it :D

i hate being reminded that it even exists 😭 out of grim curiosity i usually check to see whats going on at each release but its just..........................................its just so bad...............................................................................................

like its so out of character that i cant consider it canon even if i wanted to......... and its so BORING too!!! its so lame...........its So lame...

it doesnt make me sad anymore at least it just makes me laugh now (especially now after book 2) but like....darkly...just like... Oof...... oof......... but yeah the way clem is written specifically is actually laughable im sorry but that really is tangerine

i hate when characters get reverted just to retell the same story. like its doubly insulting. and its pretty much what tillie did with clem. and its BORING!!! and i just have to reiterate again that its also laughable. its just....painful honestly 💀 the plot is boring the characters are boring clem is a mess and her pre-existing (EXTREMELY IMPORTANT) relationships to characters from the game are basically non-existent. and we're not having any INTERESTING discussions!!! what are the themes what are the messages what is tillie trying to say here? im getting a big load of reused character arcs and what feels new falls flat on its face. clem isnt even a shadow of her former self shes a different character entirely. and she is crying waaaay too much. shes got the anger of S3 clem and not even a Fraction of the emotional regulation S1 clem had. and she was 8 then....

and her naming her prosthetic 'kenny' is fucking stupid

ive seen some people say that it would actually be an interesting comic if clem was removed from the story but i dont agree. its fucking lame and boring. i love the zombie setting for the stories it allows a writer to tell. for the emphasis on character it allows. and this is probably the most boring piece of zombie related media ive ever laid my eyes on. this definitely feels like it was written by a romance writer trying to figure out how the zombie setting Works as a storytelling device. with a beloved preexisting character that theyre Also trying to find the voice of. and we're watching it in real time. and its Painful.....

S4 will Always be the True end to clementines story. its too perfect. and it also marked the end of telltale. it was a love letter to the series. its very fitting for both clem as a character but also as a last goodbye from a beloved studio. the still not bitten teams signatures on the hallway walls always gets a sob outta me. that final goodbye... clem was meant to spend the rest of her days at ericsons with the community she helped cultivate. ive said it a million times but her losing her leg is Symbolic. the first episode isnt titled "done running" for no reason. clem never Liked being on the road. all she ever wanted was a safe place to call home. with people she trusted and loved. and now the comics are retconning all of that just to retell the same story but Badly. why should i give a shit about that?

whats unfortunate is that i DO think there are still things that could be explored with a post S4 clem. shes got what she wanted: a home. (relative) safety. community. however she has new limitations due to her injury. how would she adjust to this? after spending so many years on the road? after having to do so much independently? only having herself to rely on for the most part? these are the goals im trying to achieve with my own short little fic (that ive been working on for too long):

she would never Want to leave ericsons. home is what shes been looking for since S1. but now that shes Safe. now that she can turn off survival mode a little bit and actually Relax for once. shes going to begin Processing EVERYTHING shes been through up until this point. the true healing starts Now. but she cant run from it. so how would she reconcile these things? the whole point of ericsons was that they were a community of traumatized kids who found love and support in each other when they had nothing else. aj says it himself (S4 is Very clear in its messaging). THAT is the perfect setting for clem to ALSO have this grieving/acceptance process that she Desperately needs. everything shes been through up until this point is going to hit her like a truck. the true healing starts NOW. shes no longer fighting for her life 25/8. and when the brain can get out of survival mode it begins True processing mode.

one of the issues with the comics is that it puts her BACK into survival mode. but of clems own choosing! no matter how much her processing hurts and no matter how much she could want to run from those feelings, she has always wanted True Community more than Anything. having to reconcile those feelings is interesting! i Do think tillie is trying to have some of these conversations. but they all fall flat. her understanding of clem as a character is weak. and the environment shes in is not conducive to the healing process she wants clem to have. its a mess. i will always stand firmly in the camp that these comics should have taken place in the gap between seasons 3 and 4. that change alone wouldve boosted the comic. but unfortunately they chose.....This

anyway. back to my own post S4 adventures :)

[extasiswings]

Sorry if I'm too curious, but what you thought about Tim during these years? Because I see so many people wanting him back and then when I see LS comments I'm like🤢

Ah, Tim. Tim, Tim, Tim, Tim.

Tim suffers from what I like to call Mediocre White Man Syndrome. This is a condition that is defined by being a white man in Hollywood who has very little talent on his own, but will get extremely far in the industry by surrounding himself with exponentially more talented and creative writers whose success is then projected onto him by association. But you see, the problem with Mediocre White Man Syndrome is that said mediocre white man has to be put into a position where he can no longer fall back on the work of others to be revealed for his true self. Which is where the OG vs. LS comparison helps.

OG vs. LS is the perfect example of how a showrunner can be an absolutely terrible, talentless hack, but if surrounded by good enough people the end result will still be good enough to mask just how bad the problem is. On OG, Tim was working with a team of excellent writers and storytellers who had the ability to prop him up and smooth the edges of his bad ideas and/or steer him in better directions. On LS, he doesn't have the same cover and the difference is...stark.

But since I don't expect you to just accept this at face value, I have receipts. Subtitled: don't ever trust a bitch who can't write his own shit.

On OG, in the 5 seasons during which he was a showrunner, Tim wrote 8 episodes. Of those, all but one were co-written with at least one other writer (3 were in season 1 and were co-written with both Ryan Murphy AND Brad Falchuk). The only episode for which he has solo writing credit is the S2 finale which, as much as I can admit I love it, has some big pacing issues resulting from the fact that the main plot was started in the previous episode, Tim finished it in the first 20 minutes, and then had to fill dead air for the whole second half. [By comparison, the last episode Tim wrote for OG was 5x1, which he co-wrote with Juan Carlos Coto, and honestly imo you can tell who wrote what parts of the episode just by the stylistic differences and it's...not a good look for Tim (I'll give you a hint, the parts of the episode that truly jumped the shark? Tim)].

On LS, which is currently only 3 episodes into its fourth season, Tim has already written 10 episodes, all co-written, primarily season openers and finales.

Also on LS, Tim has primary creative control. Everything is his idea. No one is there to tell him no. When he says that he thinks that people being happy in relationships is "boring"? No one gets to be happy because he invents random drama for no reason. When he says that Carlos is going to be secretly married despite the fact that it does not match anything from S1 at all? Who cares, it's his world and we are subject to his whims. On OG, despite being showrunner, that wasn't the case. For example, things that were Tim's idea on OG: everything with Taylor (because he has some weird reporter fetish), the blackout arc. He also regularly spoke without planning anything at all and it's clear when you compare the things he said were likely to happen vs. what actually ended up on screen that although he may have signed off, the ideas were not his (hello, the majority of S4 and Eddie's trauma recovery arc in S5). Things that were other people's ideas/responsibilities: the will/guardianship situation, the tsunami arc, Buck Begins, etc.

If you want to dig deeper, on OG, 8/10 of the top 10 episodes (out of 87) were written by just 3 writers: Kristen Reidel (4), Juan Carlos Coto (2), Andrew Meyers (2) [the last two were written by writers who are no longer on the show]. Kristen is now the showrunner, and JCC, Andrew, and Lyndsey Beaulieu (who are also EPs) are clearly the core writing team - strong, stable, and consistent. Now, I have critiques of Kristen: primarily her copaganda (which has to do with personal preference) and her pacing (a more objective critique). But I have the same critiques of Tim (and much more), and at least Kristen has proven that she can write a fucking exceptional story on her own (hello? Fight or Flight? Athena Begins? Kids Today? Awful People?). And when you look at the series overall by the numbers? The top 50 OG eps (again, out of 87) are rated 8/10 or higher (and more than half of those are from writers who make up the core team now, including Kristen). For LS, that's only 15/ 45 (and there's no LS ep rated higher than 8.7). And those discrepancies have to do with the quality of the writing and the storytelling (of which Tim has been doing much more on LS than he did on OG, to LS's detriment).

Anyway, that's my spicy take of the night. The things on OG that were actually Tim's idea (like all the Taylor) were some of my least favorite parts of the show and the core things that I love about the show are things that other people were/are responsible for. And to be perfectly blunt, given his storytelling on LS, I am so happy that he no longer has control over OG (or anything to do with Buddie).

Mediocre White Man Syndrome. A Hollywood Staple.

[gravegrime]

I remember sharing this thought on twitter about storytelling as a meme like a month ago and ever since then I’ve wanted to expand on it somewhere that had the character limit for it.  Somewhere like here!  lol

This is a long one lads so feel free to skip on by if you’re not interested in all the very opinionated things I have to say.

Storytelling fills me with a firey passion that very little else does.  Being whisked away to a world full of interesting people I can observe going about their lives is something I don’t think I can ever get tired of.  With this passion, as it always does for me, comes a deep desire to analyze and understand the process on a fundemental level.  This process of discover has lead me down an interesting path that I feel many in the communities I swim will find controversial; which is a shame because I do believe the conclusions I’ve come to are true and correct.

I lead my little rant with this preamble because I want anyone who ends up reading this to know that I’m not here out of malice or contempt for the artform.  Storytelling is my life and I feel that people’s good intentions may be hurting the craft as a whole.  If you do end up reading the whole thing feel absolutely feel to argue against me or whatever you want.  Having and breeding discussion is something else I live for!

On this journey I’ve had analyzing the storytelling craft I’ve come to the conclusion that there are things about storytelling that are good practices and bad practices.  I wholeheartedly reject the pervasive ideas in the art and writing community that there is not better or worse story and everything is just different.  Honestly I’m a bit insulted by the notion.  You should have pride in your craft and try to hold the quality of your work high!  If you feel your stories don’t reach that quality bar you’re looking for work to get better at what you do!  I don’t understand how someone could claim to, ‘strive to always be a better story teller’ while also believing stories have no intrinsic values outside of what an individual reader might feel about the work.  The only conclusion that can be came to is that stories do have intrinsic qualities within them that can be judged accordingly.

Of course this invites the idea that because people value different things their standards for what makes a good story would differ.  This is true but only on a scale of personal enjoyment.  I propose that there is a standard one can apply to their work outside of individual enjoyment that can be used to judge the quality of a work.

Much like in carpentry you’d judge the quality of a chair based on it’s materials, sturdiness, and mastery of the craft, you can also judge a story by a similiar metric.  Consistency is king when it comes to stories.  Rules not being broken is essential to not having stakes and payoffs fall flat.  Characters need to stay consistent to their ideals and goals if there is to be a character at all.  Goals and ideals can shift over the course of a story of course, but how well crafted a transition is entirely predicated on the consistency of the information we’re provided.  It would be poor storytelling to have a character randomly shift goals without some established impetus.  Storytelling quality is essentially how well one can juggle consistency with the complexity of the story they’re telling.  It seems perfectly reasonable if you had two stories that are equally consistent but one is more complex it would be a better work because they achieved more.

I can, and likely will at some point, go on for hours and hours and hours about how complex and intricate the craft of storytelling is.  Like I said it’s one of my biggest passions.  I think I’ll leave this little rant establishing my basic standard here though.  I hope it might spark some interesting discussions about the craft or at least give someone some food for though :)

[ao3-softwarecorruption-exe]

📖 Writer Interview

Tagged by @writing-for-soup!!!! (unoffically lol) Defo go check out her interview, it was a blast 2 read! :D For my own answer- please continue reading after the cut!

When did you start writing?

Technically I've been trying to write ever since I was a kid. Doing small comics and writing the first pages of stories to never be finished. I loved the idea of making my own characters come to life, and to manage to write something of my own, but the task was always so daunting for me.

Then sometime during middle school I discovered fanfiction, and that made me want to writ fanfiction, though I never dared until Uni lol.

During middle school was when I started actually getting married to the idea of one day exploring writing. We had a lot of creative writing assessments during English class, and my English teacher was a wonderful lady who gave me such wonderful feedback, and she always, every single assessment, said she hoped to see me as an author one day. I hope I can tell her one day that she was the biggest reason that I never gave up on writing.

Then during Uni I finally managed to write. I found writing to be a great way to destress, and it was fun, and when I posted and got nice comments I started to lose that beginning anxiety that my words were awful and it became easier to actually get words on the page instead of just dreaming up ideas in my head.

Are there different themes or genres you enjoy reading than what you write?

Perhaps Sci-Fi? I do enjoy Sci-Fi, but I don't think I could ever wrap my head around all the sci-fi-y terms and rules haha. It requires so much thought to world building and at least a basic understanding of science to start with before you start making up your own science lol.

Is there a writer you want to emulate or get compared to often?

My favorite author might be K.A Applegate when I read all her animorphs books, and I've always enjoyed her blunt way of storytelling. I like getting to the point. But I wouldn't say I am only emulating her writing style.

I steal and take from authors everywhere, be it published authors of fellow fanfiction writers. I see a style, I consider how to mesh it with my own, until I have something a mix of all in some Frankenstein's Monster creation.

Can you tell me a bit about your writing space?

My main writing space for max productivity is the gas station right down the street of where I live. Free wi-fi, barely any people, cheap sausages, and free refills of coffee. It is my ideal environment for calm of mind, though it can get quite freezing during the winters.

Other than that there is, of course, the mess that is my room. And sometimes I will treat myself to write at a café after my lectures, or else write during my lectures. (not a good thing for my grades lol).

What's your most effective way to muster up a muse?

Probably songs. I've found that if I have a song I really like, and also connect to a certain piece of media I like, listening to that song on repeat will make me think up ideas and concepts and scenes for the characters or media that I connect it with.

It can truly be random. It's very rarely a song actually connected to that piece of media. I just decide by a whim.

Are there any recurring themes in your writing? Do they surprise you?

I've found that I enjoy writing characters who use denial as a defense mechanism. Avoiding problems, or more often the truth of their situation or their own emotions, is something I think I force upon many a character.

I asked my fantastic friend @lily-alphonse for help with this one, and she mentioned that I also use loneliness in a lot of my works. Which I believe is true. I do adore loneliness as theme or something to have a character suffer with.

What is your reason for writing?

It is fun, and I get a lot of enjoyment out of the art of creation. I love consuming art, but sometimes I need to scratch an itch that no-one can reach but myself. I am my own dumb scratching stick haha.

I've always loved the idea that when you write, you create actual little universes. Like there's a power in it, in creating, and having others see that creation and get something out of it. Art is so wonderful, so beautiful.

Also it's just so goddamn human. We can explore so much that we can't otherwise, we can get a better understanding of ourselves, the world around us, people so different or so alike. It makes me so insane, the way art can surpass us. I mean art has been around since the most early humans! Drawings, and architecture, and later writing. The earliest goddamn written story that we've found explores the same human concepts that we still ponder about today!!! Gilgamesh's intense existential dread, his fear of dying after his closest friend dies. Hello?????? Insane, wild, fantastic. Its fucking crazy, honestly, and it has brought me many spirals of existential dread and wonder at the same time.

And I mean- have you thought of how fun it is to see the same concepts shaped by the time they were written in? When I was reading Frankenstein in High School I was so fascinated by how Frankenstein acted when stressed and anxious, and how it was always explained away by him coming down with a fever. He did not have a complete mental breakdown that left him unable to leave his house for weeks due to how stressed seeing certain things would make him, no. He was sick with a fever. This was used multiple times. I found it so absolutely intriguing.

And I also just cant bare the thought of dying one day and having contributed nothing to the endless, beautiful wonder of art. I get to make things, I am so so lucky I get to make things, and I get to share what I make, and that's just. So fun. So fucking great.

Stopping myself from ranting further lmfao.

Is there any specific comment or type of comment you find particularly motivating?

God comments, I love you so much. Anything from a single emoji to a multi paragraph essay. I love you. It brings me so much joy, makes me so flustered.

The comments that have always made me fawn in utter appreciation, are those that have pointed out things I do in my writing which they enjoy. Especially concerning characterization, which tends to be the thing I'm the most anxious about when writing. When someone tells me they feel I've captured a character's personality/vibe, I feel so warm.

How do you want to be thought about by your readers?

Someone who made them feel something, if only for the duration of the read. Even if it's just momentary contentment. :)

What do you feel is your greatest strength as a writer?

Again I had to run to @lily-alphonse for help! She says that it's probably introspection, which might be true! It's something I really do love writing. God, to get into the head of people- its so fun. I love writing the way characters rationalize and think and decide on things.

How do you feel about your own writing?

Hahahha, my friends @lily-alphonse and @writing-for-soup will know that I am never at all consistent with how I feel about my own writing.

I've learnt during my journey of posting what I write, that I often love my work up until it is posted. Then I will go through a cycle of barely daring to touch it or read what I've written, and when I eventually force my gaze upon my wretched creation, there's a high chance I'll suddenly decide it is wonderful and the best thing I've ever made and wow look at me I'm such a genius I can't believe I wrote this.

When you write, are you influenced by what others might enjoy reading, or do you write purely for yourself, or a mix of both?

I mostly write for myself, though writing completely in self indulgence is something I have to work myself up to! I still write the ideas I want and daydream about, but some ideas, often of the darker and more dead-dove-do-not-eat designs, I must hype myself up for.

And I am of course influenced by trends and popular headcanons in the fandoms I am in haha.

Tagging (with no pressure); @steamyearlgray @vilukissakakskaks

[mint-in-the-moonlight]

interpreting Boethiah and the daedra

i'm mostly basing this on my understanding of lore from playing skyrim and a little bit of morrowind, oblivion and eso. if anything i say is inaccurate, feel free to correct me.

as i've been going through sources and building my worship of the aedra and daedra in the last few days i've noticed something. the way that especially the daedra are presented in the lore feels extremely one-sided. that is not to say this is true for every single piece of lore, as i have definitely not gone through all of them but the daedra are very often just seen as the "evil" gods, especially in the later games, making it hard to build any kind of "not evil" worship.

i can see this as a kind of storytelling choice made for the games and other related media but what i seem to very strongly miss is the interpretations of deities from their worshippers and more neutral or even positive points of view. the majority opinion within the games seems to be of the daedra as purely evil and even in doing the daedric quests, i'm particularly thinking of skyrim here, the player is constantly reminded of this perceived "evil" and the tasks given by the daedra often include murder, deception and other unsavoury acts.

for example, on the unofficial elder scrolls pages site, Boethiah is described as presiding over "deceit, conspiracy, secret plots of murder, assassination, treason, and unlawful overthrow of authority" (introduction, link). at face value, this seems like a deity concerned with a lot of things harmful both to an individual worshipper and their society. practically, maybe this deity would be invoked in specific situations where those domains are relevant, but would not be appropriate for regular or daily worship. though we do know that at least the ashlanders, and the dunmer more generally did worship them regularly, together with the other "good daedra" Mephala and Azura.

so, how can we interpret the daedra, and here Boethiah specifically as an example, to be more reflective of such a regular worship? well, first we need to let go of the "evil god" label. while many daedra may be associated with outright evil domains and acts, we are basically engaging with TES lore as mythology here and thus can view them as just that - myths, stories designed to share a deity's domain and/or personality, and can contain the storyteller's personal opinions and biases. i'm drawing on my understanding of the norse deity Loki and how he is often framed as "the norse devil" by the christian author of the prose edda, and the work i personally did in finding a differing interpretation of Loki besides "the guy who i basically responsible for the end of the world".

anyways, so how else could we see Boethiah? well, from the list i shared earlier from the UESP Wiki it seems that Boethiah could be broadly associated with politics, violence and upheaval. in the current political climate which is, generally speaking, tense and volatile, Boethiah could be a deity associated with resistance to the status quo, with bringing about a new, better world. this could also be on a smaller scale, Boethiah could be associated with rebellion against authority and those in power who use it against the less fortunate, or in personal relationships, dealing with someone who is restrictive or oppressive. more individually, i've seen others associate Boethiah with becoming the best version of yourself and rising above your hardships. really, the theme seems to be fighting some adversary, often bigger than you and coming out on top.

of course, in interactions with the deity people can come to many differing and individualised interpretations. i think this kind of re-interpretation is even more important when approaching the daedra that are not labeled "good", and who may seem as presiding over a lot of bad stuff, though who many people can find value in worshipping. anyways i thought it necessary to point out the bad rep that a lot of the daedra have and how we can engage with them and interpret them differently from the text of the games, letting go of a lot of the stigma that is found around daedra worship.

[douwatahima]

I have mostly been trying to stay out of the whole...situation but there is something i want to say

if you are feeling upset or heartbroken or angry or betrayed, i honestly think those feelings are valid and understandable. fiction has the power to change people, to connect people, and i feel like that's especially true with a show like this. the common narrative when season one blew up was people talking about how this show made them feel seen and understood in a way they'd never been before. i know that's how seeing both ed and stede made me feel, and for some of you, that's how izzy made you feel. you are of course allowed to feel however you feel about it and express those feelings.

however, i don't think ganging up on the writers as if they did this personally to spite you is the way to go about it. david jenkins has always been so kind with this fandom and the way he speaks about the show and about us makes me believe he does really care. i don't think he and the writers sat in a room together, rubbing their hands together and scheming about how to best take your joy away. they're storytellers who saw an arc they thought would work for a character. for some people that arc worked, and for some it clearly didn't, but either way that arc was written to tell what they felt to be the best story.

yesterday before the episode aired, i posted about how much i love this fandom and how happy i was to share this moment with so many great people. we may have our differences, but i do believe above all else in our ability to be kind. it's the thing the cast and crew have always praised us for. some of the things i've seen said today about the people who have given us this community have frankly been repugnant and harmful. by all means, feel the way you feel and express it, but please understand that there are very real people on the other side of the computer screen. please be kind.

[orionsangel86]

who cares about fandom. it's shows. shows aren't important american

This ask is really confusing to me. Are you calling me American as an insult? If so thats super funny to me since I most certainly am not American!

I know this is just someone being a dick for the sake of being a dick, but I will take this ask sincerely because I have the freedom of choice to do so. Who does care about fandom? Lots of people actually.

You know what is a huge and important fandom to lots of people worldwide? Football. Maybe you don't see it the same way because it's not about some dumb TV show, but its still a fandom. They even have different factions for different teams, and it gets weirdly nationalistic during global competition events. So who cares about fandom? Well, for football fans, I'd say about 5 billion people.

But limiting it to those unimportant shows anon has chosen to sneer at, well, in recent years comic cons around the world have reported a total of 1.8million+ attendees each year. And that is just a fraction of the fans who can afford to attend these conventions (plus these are only the big conventions not including the likes of Creation cons). Regardless of how much you sneer at it, fandom is huge and a huge part of many peoples lives. Fandom has brought people community, support, connection, and a mountain of creativity at its heart.

On a personal note, some of my best friends were met through Supernatural Fandom. We still talk regularly to this day and I try to meet up with them as often as possible even though we are all dotted all over Europe and America. Without Supernatural, a so called unimportant show, I wouldn't have those real life connections which mean so much to me and have made my life better.

Ask any actor from one of those unimportant shows, and they will tell you how they have met with fans who literally found reason to keep living through the shows that they loved, that the struggles and journeys of the characters they are passionate about literally saved their lives. Tell those people that fandom isn't important, that their shows are meaningless eh? Tell that to someone who was thinking of ending their own life but chose to keep living because they saw how important that was to their fave characters.

The Supernatural actors put out an actual crisis hotline to support fans struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts. They started campaigns like Always Keep Fighting and You Are Not Alone because they saw how much their fandom relied on them and the fandom they were apart of, because the show was their only escape from a harsh reality. Misha Collins was able to get his Random Acts charity off the ground through the support of fandom, and to this date Random Acts has succeeded in supporting communities worldwide, including providing disaster relief in Haiti and building a school in Nicaragua.

So much for an unimportant show, when its very existance has spurned a crisis network and a charity that continue to support and save lives globally.

And thats JUST Supernatural. There is so much work done by fandoms everywhere, for all different shows. Fandom is Community. And when communities get together they create wonderful things, they support each other, and sometimes, they save lives.

Who are you to say community is unimportant? Who are you anon? a user of Tumblr.com, the fandom website, to make such a bold and wrong claim? Television is storytelling, and storytelling is one of the oldest art forms. It makes us human, connects us with our past and speaks to our hearts and souls. We share our love and joy and passion through storytelling. It is where we find escape from the humdrum of our daily lives, it is where true magic lies. There is nothing unimportant about that.